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In his Oct. 9 column in The Star Press, Leonard Pitts cites a Canadian Cheerios ad in which the family depicted consists of two dads and a toddler named Raphaelle having breakfast. This scenario speaks to a lot of what the U.S. is about, too — doing "normal" everyday things in families — although the ad did not run in the U.S.

As Pitts points out, the Supreme Court stopped short of the ruling that many had hoped for, and instead simply allowed the state rulings to stand without comment. The decision is still hugely important. "Although one might have preferred a declarative statement supporting marriage equality in all 50 states to an implicit recognition of marriage quality in the places it already exists, well this non-ruling is still seismic," he writes. The way the Supreme Court dealt with the issue opened the door to legal marriage in several states, including Indiana. On the other hand, it also allowed for the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that leaves bans in place in Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee. It is, nonetheless, a beginning.

The legalization of same-sex marriage will not completely overcome the marginalization of same-sex relationships in our culture. But it is a huge step in that direction. It is a step forward toward the time when all of us and each of us need not worry about speaking the full truth about our beloved. It helps us move toward the time when we'll no longer be surprised when a male "Jeopardy" contestant makes casual mention of his boyfriend, as I heard on two recent programs, or when two young men holding hands over their morning coffee in an Ohio Starbucks won't seem unusual. It moves us as a culture toward the time when a same-sex couple's marriage license application recorded in the newspaper won't catch our attention any more than would that of a heterosexual couple.

Arnold van Gennep's research on rites of passage helps us understand the social role of marriage. Van Gennep (1873-1957) was an ethnographer who was the first to formally articulate a consistent theory about rituals that mark an individual's passage through various stages of life. His work focused on tribal rituals that in many cultures mark the transition from childhood to adulthood. However, it applies more broadly.

Briefly, rites of passage have three stages:

• In the first phase, or separation, people withdraw from their current status, detaching from their previous social location. A couple becoming engaged to marry is a relevant example.

• The transitional phase, which van Gennep called "liminality," is characterized by ambiguity and in-betweenness. Individuals have left their previous stage and social location, but have not yet entered into what is to follow. It may be marked by a variety of events and rituals which serve to move the transition forward. Think of engagement parties, times of meeting the intended spouse's relatives or meeting them under different circumstances, looking for an apartment or house that will be the couple's new home, planning the ceremony itself.

• The third phase is one of re-incorporation. The person who has completed the transitional rites re-enters their society with a new status and identity, not only in their own mind and heart, but in the eyes of their culture.

Van Gennep's research highlights why the legal legitimation of same-sex marriage is important. When an entire group of people is prevented by law from attaining the stage that in their culture legitimates their relationship, then it destroys community. Community seeks the good for all persons, respecting the inherent worth and dignity of all people by granting them the same rights. Liberal religious author James Luther Adams ("On Being Human Religiously") points out that religious liberalism is in part about liberation from "the idolatries of creedalism, of church and political authoritarianism, or nationalistic, racial, or sexual chauvinism." Liberal religion also seeks to liberate us from gender-identity and sexual-orientation chauvinism as well.

As Apple CEO Tim Cook, who recently came out publically as gay, put it, "We can't change the past, but we can learn from it, and we can create a different future." We can create a future in which there will not be heterosexual marriage and same-sex marriage. We can create a future in which there is just "marriage," the joining of two people in love, not only in their own hearts and minds, but in the eyes of their society. As a community, let's walk through the door the Supreme Court has opened. Let's open our hearts and minds, as well as social and legal arrangements, to a time when there is not "straight marriage" or "same-sex marriage," "gay marriage" or "one man one woman marriage," but simply, "marriage."

I believe the Muncie community is up to the challenge.

Julia Corbett-Hemeyer is community minister for the Unitarian Universalist Church of Muncie.